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Source text - EnglishUnemployment Benefits Are not Stimulus
Let's not reduce the incentive to find work. A federal tax holiday is a better way to cut the high jobless rate'
BY ARTHUR B. LAFFER

The current debate over extending and increasing federal unemployment benefits encapsulates the disagreement
between the Democrats in power in Washington and their Republican opponents. What the consequences will be
of raising unemployment benefits in today's depressed economy is at issue.
The most obvious argument against extending or raising unemployment benefits is that it will make being unemployed either more attractive or less unattractive, and thereby lead to higher unemployment. Empirical research supports this view.
The Democratic retort is that the economy today is so different from the past that we have to suspend our traditional understanding of economics' with five
job seekers for every job opening, the unemployed are desperate for work and increasing unemployment benefits will have very little if any disincentive effect. This view hinges on a total change in employee behavior from "normal"
times to the current period of "the Great Recession'"